Goal:
ZAR R11,000,000
Raised:
ZAR R2,100
Campaign funds will be received by LEFT Futures
Paradoxes are bound to be multidimensional right? As are, I suppose, innovations and ideations.
We don't want to get bogged down but I have to tell the story in a manner that approximates truth.
It centres on a lemon orchard, green and gracious that bristles bravely on the breeze as if unafraid of the dark, unrelenting squatter sprawl that bares down from Bushbuckridge like a burgeoning lava field - insatiable and all consuming.
But it's not only about lemons of course, so let me start somewhere else.
In South Africa's Mpumalanga Province, there's a small town called Hazyview - a partly preserved purvey to the Kruger National Park and the Sabie Sands Game Reserve.
Like so many other rural towns, Hazyview is hemmed in by poorly managed Land Reforms and unregulated urban sprawl. Our facilitators were active in this area - many years ago - working with rival tribes and local businesses to peg some points of order amidst the rising flood of chaos.
One particular area brought a degree of success - a series of community-private partnerships that saw the development of a conservancy, a few small commercial farms and the somewhat famous Elephant Whispers sanctuary.
Alas, we recently learned that one of these community-private partnerships - the lemon farm standing on the now swollen verges of a criminal haven known as Marite - is faltering. Brave and bold as the farm operators are, they have grown weary and appear to be on the brink of collapse.
Thankfully, there are other farmers willing to step into the breach - a fresh set of hands and legs willing and able to revive and operate the farm. But this will take more than guts and glory. The 50-hectare orchard with its drooping fence and leaking pipes will need at least R11m of money and a year or more of time to regain its stature and resume its pivotal purpose.
It's been more than a decade now since we bought into the hypothesis that sound commercial projects present solid social solutions. Of course things can get complicated and few plans fully withstand the rocks of reality, but we have facilitated so many life changing community-private partnerships over the years that for now, still, we believe that the hypothesis holds.
You may not have heard of this place called Hazyview before - Bushbuckridge or Kruger park; Sabie Sands or many more. But you can well imagine the depth and breadth of the struggle for the farming firms and the local leaders and the ordinary people who confront the still-forming legacies of rural South Africa in the 21st century.
We intend to invest the capital needed to retain the lemon land. We've committed to collaborate with the farming firm that's got the guts and has walked this walk. With your help, we'll facilitate and finance a new community-private partnership that holds up the dominoes north of Hazyview; that shines a light on the verges of Marite; that allows the elephants, the farmers, the fauna and flora to revivify the belief that there is goodness in the Future South Africa.
If you want to know more about us at LEFT Futures; the lemon farm and the new farmers; the chaos and the criminality of Marite; please don’t hesitate to reach out to me. Till then, shine brightly!
Hope this works
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